Fyodor Koniukhov plans to trek along the Great Silk Road
The famous Russian adventurer Fyodor Koniukhov plans to undertake a camel-back expedition along the Great Silk Road next year. The entire route will extend across more than 10 countries, from Russia to China. Mr Koniukhov’s last adventure was a single-handed world race aboard his yacht around Antarctica in winter and spring of this year (the summer and autumn in the southern hemisphere).
18 June 2008
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=28534&cid=87&p=18.06.2008 (in English)
Russian inflation rate so far this year is 8.3 percent
Aleksei Kudrin (1960- ), Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister
The Russian inflation rate so far this year is 8.3 percent. According to Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Aleksei Kudrin, rocketing food and fuel prices worldwide are likely to make the targeted annual inflation limit of 10.5 percent fairly unrealistic.
18 June 2008
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=28557&cid=46&p=18.06.2008 (in English)
If the Ukraine enters NATO, Russia can reclaim the Crimean Peninsula
Dmitri Rogozin (1963- ), Russian ambassador to NATO
If the Ukraine enters NATO, Russia can reclaim the Crimean Peninsula. In a newspaper interview Wednesday, Dmitri Rogozin, the Russian ambassador to NATO, recalled the fact that Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchov commemorated 300 years of the renewal of Russian-Ukrainian unity when he transferred the peninsula to Ukraine in 1954. Moreover, when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the Ukraine solemnly undertook to remain neutral.
18 June 2008
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=28563&cid=47&p=18.06.2008 (in English)
Russian nuclear icebreakers resume summer tourist trips to the North Pole
Russian nuclear icebreakers are resuming their summer tourist trips to the North Pole. At the end of June, the newest icebreaker, Fifty years of Victory, will set off for its first journey of the year, reported Andrei Smirnov, a spokesman for the Murmansk Shipping Company. For some years now, their icebreakers have transported travellers to distant areas of the Arctic Ocean. In the course of a normal 16-day trip, Russian and foreign tourists visit not only the Pole itself, but, also, the Franz Josef Islands.
18 June 2008
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=28535&cid=48&p=18.06.2008 (in English)
Russian prosecutors charge three men with carrying out Anna Politkovskaya’s assassination
Anna Politkovskaya (1958-2006), Russian investigative reporter, murdered by Chechen terrorists
Russian prosecutors have formally charged three men, all Chechens, with organising and carrying out the assassination of the investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who was gunned down in October 2006 in the stairwell of her apartment house in Moscow. All three are being held. The investigating committee at the Moscow prosecutor general’s office announced that the preliminary investigation was concluded, and the three, Sergei Khadzhikurbanov, Dzhabrail Makhmudov and Ibragim Makhmudov, were set to stand trial for murder. A fourth suspect, believed to be the kingpin, is hiding abroad. Ms Politkovskaya won acclaim for exposing wrongs in the Russian Caucasus.
18 June 2008
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=28558&cid=48&p=18.06.2008 (in English)
Kosachov feels the crisis over the recognition of the UDI of Kosovo is what split the EU
Konstantin Kosachov (1962- ), chairman of the RF Gosduma Foreign Affairs Committee
The issue of the recognition of the UDI of the Serbian province of Kosovo has split the European Union in two, said Konstantin Kosachov, the chairman of the RF Gosduma Committee for Foreign Affairs, in an interview with Voice of Russia. At least seven EU nations have said loud and clear they will under no circumstances recognise Kosovo’s independence. According to Mr Kosachov, those behind the Kosovo adventure gambled that they would manage to quickly obtain world recognition of the Serbian province’s independence. Now that four months have elapsed, those opposed to Kosovo’s independence are still in the majority. Mr Kosachov feels that the issue of Kosovo shall have top priority on the agenda of the forthcoming Russia-EU summit in Khanty-Mansisysk.
18 June 2008
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=28515&cid=45&p=18.06.2008 (in English)
Ukrainian opposition contents legitimacy of Orange ruling coalition
Viktor Yanukovych (1950- ), leader of the patriotic opposition in the Ukraine
In Kiev, the opposition Party of Regions asked the Constitutional Court to deny legitimacy to the government of the Orange coalition of President Yushchenko and Prime Minister Timoshenko. Departure by two Rada deputies left the coalition without a constitutional majority in the Ukrainian Supreme Rada. A new government crisis is in the offing.
18 June 2008
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=28564&cid=45&p=18.06.2008 (in English)
Voice of Russia World Service
